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As you can see the from the SS below, most countries in Europe have created massive armies. So much so, Belgium and France have begun to use my airports as their bases!

Not one of them are at war with anyone, yet they continue to build units that slow the game.

Is there any way to have their numbers reduced?

Thanks

http://imageshack.us/f/141/europen.jpg/

Old topic, as Mr Latour would type, please use search to look for a subject before starting a new thread.

Short of "cheating", by loading the game in multiplay, logging in as the other countries, or modding, if you know how, no. It has been stating numerous times by Mr Geczy, that the goal of the AI in 2020 is to make it difficult for you to take them over. As such they will choke themselves on units until the game ends or you computer comes to a chugging halt.

Is that to say that no matter what PC you have the game will eventually become unequivocally unplayable because the AI keeps building units? Isn`t there a unit limit for the game? I know some games do have a maximum unit limit for the entire map after which the engine stops you from building more.

I do not want to say unplayable. I personally have never reached an unplayable stage. In the early days, when I first started playing the game, I would at times let it run overnight as I slept. There is no fear of doing this, since you can configure it to pause on events, such as war declarations. If you have a stable economy and are at peace, let it churn.

That being typed, I do not do that any longer as my play style has evolved. Now I am always here at the screen watching the world and trying to influence it as I would want it to be. 20, 50, 70 years in, the game is still playable. Now there are some things that greatly influence how this plays out.

In my opinion, the two largest issues being China and Russia. If they are taken out and those 1000's of units are removed from the game or even reserved, the game runs noticeably better.

Another issue is the settings you use, Fog of War, Line of Sight, etc. If I recall, the game is coded to have each unit check its field of view. Now, imagine, even though you may not be able to see all the units in the world, the game engine does and has to process every single one of them.

In my own experience there are 2 times a day when I can notice "lag/stutter/slowdown". At the bottom of the hour and at the top of the hour. Now, I am not computer literate at all, but just from observations I would guess the game checks units at the top of the hour and calculates the production side of things at the bottom. I notice the messages like, we have 16 land slots empty always come near the bottom of the hour, or research recommendations.

I could be entirely wrong, but it is just the feeling I get while watching the game unfold.

The bottom line is, the game has never been unplayable for me, but you are going to get some slowdown as more and more things need to be processed.


If there is a limit to the number of units allowed, I have never seen it reached.

******

Off topic but relevant I think.

One of the things I think could have alleviated this cycle is to have diminishing resources. Each region has a finite amount of a resource, let's take Petroleum as an example. If I start the game as the U.S.A. and I build up a massive army, more and more Petroleum is used/removed from the game. Eventually I will have none left. I am left with 3 options.

1. Reduce the size of my military

2. Try to obtain Petro on the world market

3. Take over another region with Petroleum reserves.

Now, 1 and 2 are viable options, but even they have a limited life span as eventually the worlds Petroleum would be exhausted. As each region reaches it maximum output, whereby no more may be pumped from the ground, they should start realizing from that point on it is only a matter of time. This means they would stop wanting to sell the limited amount they have left and keep it for personal use.

As the world market "dries up" more and more countries have to slow or stop unit production. This has the effect of fewer units in the game, but keeps a balance as far as individual countries are concerned.

Saudi Arabia may be leaps and bounds behind the U.S.A. in technology, but with its vast Petroleum reserves they can field a larger military. As an example.

As the game is coded now, money is the only resource you need to win. With enough of it, you can purchase anything you want because all resources are unlimited.

Sorry for the tangent.

NOTE: In game Petroleum includes Natural Gas, which I ignored for the sake of the above example.

Thank you for that detailed elaboration!


For me 20 years into the game it became rather slow. I suppose it depends on what you`re running it on.


Does it also have anything to do with the small island nations swarming with units in the same tile?


You mean disabling the Fog of War?


You think it makes no difference if the units are visible to you or not? I was wondering if the game slows just because of the total number of units on the entire map or instead/also because as it progresses you get treaties with everyone around and you start seeing most of the map and all of the units of the other countries.
EDIT: by reading alot of other threads on the same subject I`m getting the message that the engine calculates everything as if it were visible so I guess it doesn`t matter(in speed terms) if you see all of the map or not via signed treaties.

Small island nations - of course every unit on the map affects the speed. It is simply that I have seen improvements after China and Russia have been removed from the game, or at least their units reserved.

Units visible - The game will calculate each units visibility, makes no matter if you can see it. But of course, IF you can see the rest of the worlds units then it will increase what has to be rendered for you to see, so I imagine that is another reason the game will slow down.

As an aside, I hardly bother with recon satellites in normal games and I always play with FOW turned on and Enhanced Spotting/Ranges off. (so I have no personal experience with how these affect speed)

Incidently, I have a Serbian game going now where it is Sep 2036. Both China and Russia (my ally) are still in game. I do have Recon Sats at 100% coverage, and there is a notceable "stutter" when I scroll the map.


The only person I have seen that really knows this stuff, as far as I can tell, is Mr. George Geczy.